“No, Pearl. I don’t have to ask anyone for permission. I can ask anyone I want to substitute, as long as they’re qualified. You know as much as I do about this job. You are qualified.”
I draw in a deep breath then release it slowly. Every time we’ve had a substitute the lady has been white. There isn’t a black housemother on the entire campus. In either sororities or fraternities. Never has been.
Projections of how the alums and parents may react are swirling in and out of my mind already. I can’t help picturing their faces when they see me. Will I be welcomed into the fold or treated like a black sheep? It’s one thing for a black lady to cook or clean in this milky-white House. It’s another thing altogether for a woman of color to be the one in charge.
SIXTEEN
CALI
“She would do that?” I ask Ellie when she offers to have her mother write me an Alpha Delt rec. I’d gotten into the habit of coming over to her room when Jasmine and Carl start their last phone call of the night, and I am sitting on the end of her bed. It’s late, midnight, but no one in Martin goes to bed early.
Most of the girls on our floor get their homework done in the library during the day and reserve nighttime for socializing. And partying. And tons of laughing. Though we only met two weeks ago, it feels like Ellie and I have known each other two years. Friendships come fast and easy when you’re living on the same floor of the dorm.
Ellie and I are sitting together on her bed with our backs up against her headboard. She reaches over and pats me on the arm. “Of course. My mom would be happy to do that for you.”
“That would be sweet,” I say.
“Email me your rec packet.” She writes out her email on a notepad by her bed and hands it to me. “I’ll call her in the morning.”
After speaking with a girl in the Panhellenic office last fall about how to join a sorority, I started putting my rec packet together. She said I needed arésuméstressing community service, leadership, and academics. Fortunately, I am strong in all three areas.
Mamaw has a friend in Memphis who has a friend who was a Kappa Kappa Gamma and she was willing to write me a rec. After she saw my résumé, that same lady offered to find more friends who could write recs. She seemed to think I would be a great candidate for a sorority, and that I shouldn’t have any problems. But I do.
After not having a pedigree, the next problem is: I don’t have recs for all thirteen sororities on campus. And the third problem is: I don’t think I have enough money. From what I learned in that same phone call to Panhellenic, I might need as much as five thousand dollars my first year and I’ve only managed to save three.
It wouldn’t hurt, I learned, to have several additional letters of reference from other alumnae. The girl I spoke with in the Panhellenic office told me to ask my mother’s friends for the letters. She said I’d be surprised to learn how many of them had been in sororities. I told her thank you very much for the information and hung up the phone. What I didn’t tell her was that my mother has no friends.
Annie Laurie looks up from the Spanish textbook she’s been reading with a cool smile. Her face always confuses me. Is she genuine or… is she fake? She doesn’t offer to have her mother write a letter of reference: not that it matters all that much, but I still wonder why. I shrug it off and hop down from the bed. “I’ll go do that now and let y’all get ready for bed.”
“Is Jasmine asleep?” Annie Laurie asks, before I get to the door.
I glance over my shoulder. “Not yet. She and Carl are having their final lovey-dovey convo of the day. Those two are on the phone, like, constantly,” I say, with a giggle.
“Black people are always on the phone.”
What an odd remark.“Really? I haven’t noticed.”
“Next time you’re walking to class, pay attention. You’ll see what I mean.” She’s talking, but her eyes don’t leave her Spanish book.
That’s good because my eyes are on the pill bottle on her vanity, right next to her makeup mirror. Annie Laurie Whitmore. Adderall 10 mg. Take 2x day. Not that I care, but it does strike me as curious why she takes it. She doesn’t seem like she has ADHD.
My hand is on the doorknob when she adds, “Cali? Why didn’t your parents move you into your room?”
Everything inside of me tightens. My head feels light and my body grows warm. How long has she been dying to know the answer to this? “I live with my grandparents,” I say, without turning around.
“How come?” I can feel her eyes burning into the back of my head.
Slowly, I turn around to face her. “Because my parents are dead.” Annie Laurie’s forehead shoots up and she flies a hand to her mouth. By the look on her face, I can practically hear the questions coursing through her mind. My heart is pounding loud enough for the whole dorm to hear.
“That sucks,” she says. “I’m sorry.”
I zip the cross hanging around my neck back and forth on the chain, something I do when I’m anxious. “It’s okay.”
“Cali. That’s horrible,” Ellie says crawling to the edge of her bed. “I’m so sorry.”
“Thanks. But it’s all good. My grandparents are better than parents.”
“How—” Annie Laurie opens her mouth to ask, I’m certain, another of the nosy questions she stores in her arsenal—about how they died or when they died—but Ellie blurts, “I’m not trying to be rude, y’all, but I have to go to sleep. I have a test in the morning and I don’t do well without sleep.”
